Martin Schram: When presidency and press corps collide

Scripps Howard News ServicePublished: March 7, 2013 4:00AM

Dysfunction abounds at Washington's most congested crossroads, that place where the 1600 block of Pennsylvania Avenue NW intersects with the global information highway -- and the interests of White House strategists often collide with those of journalists who cover them.

The resulting wreckage is often a tangle of fictional facts and twisted truths.

Moments later, the same onlookers witnessed journalists fretting about what they perceived as threats by the White House against The Washington Post's Bob Woodward. But upon further review, those concerns seemed as overblown and unverifiable, in their own way, as some of those sequester wailings.

The closer we look at what is happening at this famous intersection, the more unnecessary and unprofessional it all seems.

There's no doubt sequester cuts will hurt America's defense readiness and some vital domestic programs. But in their zeal to spread a worst-case scenario, Obama officials damaged the one thing a president needs most in a crisis: his credibility.

My friend and former Washington Post colleague, Bob Woodward, wrote an opinion piece detailing how the sequester began as an Obama White House idea. He ended the piece by saying that the sequester was originally only about spending, but that Obama was changing his deal by seeking new tax increases.

Obama's White House understandably sought to discredit Woodward's version. Meanwhile, Woodward, in an interview with Politico, read part of an email from someone he identified only as a senior White House official. It said: "I think you will regret staking out that claim."

Journalists began widely interpreting that as a White House threat against Woodward.

But wait. In its full context, it seemed rather unthreatening. The official, whom we learned later was Obama economic adviser Gene Sperling, wrote his email in a conciliatory tone after having earlier shouted at Woodward on the phone about his upcoming article. Sperling's full sentence was: "I know you may not believe this, but as a friend, I think you will regret staking out that claim."

Quite different. Journalists who covered past White Houses understood this episode never reached the level of threats presidential advisers made and carried out against journalists. The Post's legendary Watergate duo of Woodward and Carl Bernstein know best of all that Richard Nixon's White House retired the cup for threats and retaliation against journalists.

The Obama White House, having inherited a press corps that was thrilled at the prospect of covering America's first black president, has had an amazingly troubled relationship with journalists covering the beat. Obama holds fewer news conferences than his predecessors and when he does, he only calls on correspondents whose names are on a list from his staff. Most reporters attend knowing they aren't really there as full-fledged journalists, just decorative scenery.

One of the surprising shortcomings of Obama's team has been its difficulty in communicating its messages. Obama and his strategists have not skillfully massaged, let alone mastered, the symbiotic relationship all presidents have with their chroniclers.

Meanwhile, journalists covering the presidency and politics still cannot resist fanning the flames as they cover Washington's fires.